


navigating domestic life

by waywardbrain



Category: Tomb Raider (Video Games)
Genre: Domestic Fluff, Established Relationship, F/F, Fluff, Is it fluff? I think so., Married life with a kid, video game references
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-10
Updated: 2020-08-10
Packaged: 2021-03-06 02:53:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,098
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25826230
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/waywardbrain/pseuds/waywardbrain
Summary: Lara could navigate tombs and ruins well, is that the case for domestic married life too?
Relationships: Lara Croft/Samantha Nishimura
Comments: 8
Kudos: 92





	navigating domestic life

‘’The path is dark and guarded by bats, said the red knight,’’ Lara was sitting on a small bed, with a child curled against her side as she was reading one of her favorite childhood stories. 

‘’The white queen regarded him with a curious smile and said….’’ 

‘’Bats! I am not afraid of bats. I am not afraid of anything!’’ Hayley read from the page with excitement as she raised her arms high. 

‘’My fearless little cub,’’ Lara laughed as she started to tickle her daughter who now erupted in giggles as she tried to move away from her mother. Lara maneuvered the comforter so that her daughter was under them again. ‘’All trapped! Now it is time to sleep.’’

‘’Mum! I am not tired yet,’’ Hayley tried to wiggle out from under the covers again. ‘’It’s not even a school night.’’ 

‘’It's already way past your bedtime, even for a non school night.’’ Lara stood up and grabbed the book, putting it back in the bookcase, to show that another bedtime story was no longer an option. 

When she turned around, the bed was empty, with a sigh she looked around the sizable room. No room in the manor was small. 

‘’Mummy, look at my drawing I made,’’ Hayley had walked back to her mother and proudly presented the piece of paper with her drawing on it. 

Lara let out a little sigh as she lifted her daughter and placed her back on the bed again. She left the drawing aside for a minute as she tucked in her daughter once again for the night. ‘’Tell me about the drawing, my little treasure,’’ she grabbed the drawing again and sat down on the edge of the bed. 

‘’Well, this is me, standing in the garden,’’ she pointed to the figure who stood in between tall green spikes. 

‘’And what is that?’’ She pointed to a figure next to her daughter, having no idea what it could represent. All she could make out of it was that it had big ears. 

‘’That’s my puppy…Well...If I had a puppy….’’ Hayley looked up to her mother and smiled as sweetly as she could. ‘’Can I get a puppy, mummy?’’ 

Lara raised an eyebrow as she looked at the drawing once more. ‘’What kind of dog?’’ She knew what her answer would already be. 

‘’A c-c-orgi! One like the queen has. They aren’t too big, so I can bring it when I get to visit you on adventures! Or I could get a really big dog, and then they can help you!’’ 

‘’No, you are not getting a puppy.’’ Lara didn’t like dogs, sure they were cute to pet. But the thought of taking them to walk them three times a day no matter the weather circumstances or the puppy running through the library and destroying priceless artifacts, what a horror that would be. 

‘’But I have been good, mum,’’ she pointed to her drawing again. ‘’Look! It’s cute. I promise I will take care of it and play with it and give it lots of cuddles!’’ 

‘’No.’’ 

‘’B-B-But mom is okay with it, she told me to ask you and said that you would say yes too!’’ Okay maybe that last part was a lie, her mom didn’t need to know that. 

‘’Did she now?’’ Lara tilted her head and shook her head once more. This was something she was going to have to discuss with Sam. 

‘’Yes,’’ she nodded and started to pout, knowing that it was something she could do to persuade either of her parents. It worked for the little things. ‘’So can I get a puppy?’’ 

‘’How about a stuffed animal corgi?’’ 

‘’It’s not the same! I will never ask for anything else again.’’ 

Lara had doubt that was true. She laughed at the effort her daughter was making to ask for the dog. ‘’No, sorry, dear. You will have to do with your stuffed animals.’’ 

Hayley pouted again, when there came no answer from her mother she sighed and laid on her side, pulling the blanket up to her neck. It was a sign that she was upset. ‘’I just want someone to play with when both of you are gone,’’ she said softly. 

The work-family balance had gotten better over the years as Hayley aged and was old enough to accompany them on trips. It still happened on occasion that both her moms worked at the same time and had to be at different locations. Sometimes it was also just too dangerous for either Sam or Hayley to join Lara on her expeditions. There was also the fact that she was often the only child being surrounded by adults in a foreign area if she went on one of their trips.

To see her daughter like that saddened Lara. She gently stroked her daughter’s hair with a soft sigh. ‘’The puppy will miss you when you have to go to school. Even more when you leave for boa-’’ she hadn’t talked yet about boarding school with her child. Then she would be stuck with a dog she didn’t want. 

‘’I am not at school for long! When I am home I can spend all day and night playing with it!’’ Her child was not one to give up. 

‘’I’ll think about it, alright? Now it is really time for bed.’’ Lara kissed her daughter’s forehead and stood up from the bed. ‘’Goodnight, my little treasure.’’

‘’Okay,’’ Hayley said softly as she nodded. Tomorrow was another day to try again. ‘’Mummy?’’ 

Lara stood by the door now and looked over her shoulder. ‘’Yes?’’ 

‘’Will you be here tomorrow when I wake up?’’ 

‘’Of course.’’ 

‘’Promise?’’ 

‘’I promise.’’ 

Lara closed the door behind her after she saw that her daughter closed her eyes. She sighed and rubbed her neck as she walked towards her bedroom and ran the conversation through her mind again. 

Did her father feel this same guilt when he went away for one of their trips? Or when he received a letter from her asking to join him again. Lara and Sam both slowed down for the first couple years that Hayley was born but picked up their work again when she was getting older. 

Seven years ago Hayley Amelia Croft was born, it was the best day of Lara's life. A love so powerful and pure, was the way her mother described the bond between mother and daughter. She was right when she wrote that one day Lara would feel it too. 

Her name was a subtle nod to the Egpytian Goddess Hathor, who was the daughter of sun God Ra, who Lara was named after. Sam liked the name well enough but she rolled her eyes with a smile when Lara explained the reasoning behind the name and made a comment in jest about turning her into a nerd from the womb already. 

The trip to memory lane had come to a halt when she entered her bedroom and caught the sight of her wife, who was dressed in only a short red nightgown, sitting on the edge of their bed with one leg stretched out as she was putting some lotion on it. 

Sam looked up when she noticed that the door opened. There stood her wife, with her mouth slightly open. It was still so easy to fluster Lara, even after their many years together they were still very much attracted to each other. Purposefully, Sam ignored her for a few seconds more and finished up moisturizing her leg. 

Focus, Lara, focus, she had an argument to win and her mind had to get itself out of the gutter. ‘’You took a bath without me?’’ she whined as she closed the door behind her. 

‘’I had to, you were taking so long to put our child to bed,’’ she stretched out her other leg and began putting some lotion on it, extra slow, just for Lara. The key to good skin is moisturizing. ‘’Couldn’t let the water get cold.’’

This was punishment, wasn’t it? Lara couldn’t keep her eyes away from her wife's leg. ‘’Well, that is not entirely my fault….’’ 

‘’Isn’t it?’’ Sam tilted her head and looked at Lara, she knew as soon as Lara began telling a story of one of her expeditions to their daughter that it wouldn’t be over soon. ‘’She knows by now to ask for one of your stories before she goes to bed and you always indulge her.’’ 

‘’Tonight, I did not indulge her,’’’ Lara crossed her arms and gave a stern look to Sam. ‘’Our daughter apparently wants a puppy and you already said yes.’’ 

‘’Yes, I did,’’ she nodded as she got under the covers, like nothing was wrong and they were done talking about the subject. 

‘’Sam, darling, I love you and Hayley very much but we are not getting a dog,’’ Lara shook her head as she began changing her clothes for the night. 

‘’Why are you so against it?’’ questioned Sam as she sat up and turned to her wife. 

‘’Because we all know who is going to take care of it the most, it won’t be you or Haley, it would be me. Scooping up it’s poop and walking it in the rain.’’ 

Sam turned her laugh into a cough, because she knew it was true. ‘’I’ll help out, by documenting everything and probably feed it. I still need to remind you to eat from time to time when you get so focused with one of your dusty books.’’ 

‘’So all the easy stuff? Of course, Sam Croft would never endanger her hair by exposing her long locks in horrendous British weather conditions.’’ 

‘’Easy stuff?’’ Sam raised one eyebrow and huffed. ‘’I carried her for nine months and was in labour for more than twelve hours!’’ 

‘’We’re talking about a hypothetical dog, and you almost broke my hand while you were in labour,’’ that was absolute exaggeration, but it did hurt. 

That reply got her a very stern look from Sam. ‘’I literally pushed out a baby between my legs. When you do it, you get to complain about pain,’’ pregnancy did wonders for her cup size for a while, true, but it was not something she would like to repeat again. Once was enough. 

‘’We’re off subject,’’ Lara changed the subject before getting more stern looks from her wife. ‘’She won’t even be here to take care of the dog when she leaves for boarding school in a few years!’’ 

‘’We are not sending our daughter to boarding school,’’ Sam frowned. 

‘’We are not?’’ Lara tilted her head, like she was confused. She didn’t like to admit it, at certain times she could still be very posh. 

‘’Nope.’’ 

‘’Wait, one argument at a time, please, I can’t keep up.’’ 

‘’Pick one, then.’’ 

Why did she feel like she was losing both the arguments? Lara and Sam stared at each other for a good minute before Lara began to talk. ‘’Boarding school.’’

‘’Don’t you remember how it was for yourself when they sent you away?’’ 

‘’She is not like me, Hayley is more sociable and takes more after you, she will make many friends.’’ Lara cuddled up to Sam when she remembered her days away from her parents. ‘’It’s not the same, while my parents were gone, she still has us to write and come home to.’’

Sam wrapped her arms around her wife and kissed her temple, ‘’She already misses you like crazy when you go away for one of your expeditions. She misses us both when neither of us can be with her. I don’t think boarding school will help with that.’’ 

‘’Boarding school rank amongst the best of the country…’’ 

‘’There are lots of private schools that are good without needing to send her away,’’ Sam replied. Lara curled Sam’s hair around her finger, absently playing with it as she continued to listen to her wife. ‘’We both grew up with parents who weren’t there for us, with different reasons. It’s not how I want to raise our daughter. I don’t want to miss out on her childhood.’’ 

‘’What about our work, then?’’ 

‘’Maybe it’s time for you to slow down a bit again…’’ Sam suggested, carefully. ‘’You are in your late thirties, babe.’’ 

‘’I am not old,’’ huffed Lara, rather annoyed. 

‘’You don’t have to stop,’’ she knew that Lara wouldn’t stop, no matter who asked. She had tried in the past, but Lara would only give her a weak smile and say ‘not yet.’. ‘’Just be a bit more...careful’’

After trinity was defeated and she had gotten older, hired mercenaries became less of a problem. Her own body was starting to become her worst enemy. In a few years it could even mean her demise. The archaeologist had gotten slower and was less agile. She hardly ever came home without a scratch on her, even on the expeditions that she promised were completely safe. 

‘’Love,’’ Lara sighed, this wasn’t the first time they had this conversation. She kissed Sam’s collar bone and rested her head on her chest, letting her ear pick up the rhythm of Sam’s heartbeat. ‘’I will always try to be as careful as possible.’’ 

‘’I know,’’ Sam whispered as she caressed Lara’s cheek with her thumb. This was going to be endless discussion until one of them would push it too far. 

‘’She can’t always come with either of us and when she does she is often the only child.’’ Lara shifted the conversation back to the previous topic, to avoid having to talk more about her limiting or pausing her work.

‘’A perfect reason for a furry friend, then,’’ commented Sam. She had started her own production company that was doing very well. As she expanded the company, she needed an office in the city. ‘’We just need to find the right balance.’’ 

‘’I suppose you are right, perhaps boarding school is not the right option,’’ Lara nodded. ‘’Still not settled on the dog, though. Can I get her a cat? Much easier to take care of.’’ 

‘’I think our daughter is set on having a Corgi.’’ 

‘’I’ll think about it,’’ she gave the same answer she gave her daughter. 

And with that, Sam had just won both the arguments, knowing that Lara would give in eventually. ‘’Perfect, goodnight then, sweetie.’’ 

Lara was pleased that both the arguments were over. ‘’I’m not quite tired, yet,’’ she moved her hand to Sam’s thigh, gently caressing the soft skin as she pushed up the fabric of the nightgown. 

‘’Now look who doesn’t want to keep to their bedtime schedule,’’ she chuckled and playfully slapped Lara’s hand away, ‘’you are not getting any.’’ 

Lara arched her brow and leaned back so that she could look at Sam, being quite surprised by the actions of her wife. 

‘’Aww, you are cute, sweetie,’’ she leaned to place a quick and soft peck on Lara’s lips. ‘’You missed your chance earlier this night.’’ 

Lara groaned and let her head fall into the pillow with a soft thud. ‘’This is so unfair.’’ 

Sam chuckled some more before she turned the lights off in the bedroom. A minute later she could see the light coming from Lara’s side of the bed. ‘’No electronics in the bedroom at night.’’ The rule of no phone, tablet, laptop or any kind of electronics was set in place to aid with their sex life. Not that they really needed it, but both were known to take their work home, and at times the bedroom. 

‘’It’s a stupid rule when we’re not even going to shag,’’ Lara muttered under her breath as she turned off her tablet. 

‘’What was that?’’ 

‘’Nothing, goodnight, love.’’ 

In the next two weeks, Lara began to research Corgis to find more information about that and to see if they were a fit for the family. In the back of her head, she knew the moment she began looking up information was the moment she gave in.

Another month later, she had caved in and had brought home a red Pembroke Welsh Corgi, one with his tail still intact. She held the puppy in her hands, lifting it to her face while she gave it a stern look, ‘’You better behave.’’ The puppy let out a soft bark and leaned in to lick Lara’s face. ‘’Ugh, gross,’’ she said, disgusted as she put the puppy down again and cleaned her face with a tissue. 

They sat in the garden, waiting for Sam and Haley to return. The puppy was quite energetic and ran circles around Lara, not sitting still for a moment. God, this puppy would need a lot of training. When she heard footsteps approaching she picked up the puppy, hiding him behind her chair, in an attempt to shush him. Lara quickly opened a book and tried to act normal. 

‘’Hey, sweetie,’’ Sam pecked Lara’s lips as a greeting when they reached her, which she happily returned. 

Their daughter scrunched her nose when she saw the kiss,’’Yuck.’’ 

Both the mothers chuckled with the reaction of their daughter. Hayley was about to give her mum a hug, as a greeting, when she saw the puppy carefully approaching her. ‘’Puppy!’’ she exclaimed, happily. 

The dog smelled her stretched out hand a bit carefully before he started to excitedly jump around her and wag his little tail when he got petted by the child. ‘’Can we keep it, mum, pretty please?’’ she was practically begging. 

‘’Well…’’ she tried to draw it out, but when she saw that her daughter was too busy paying attention to the dog she just chuckled again. ‘’Yes, we are keeping him. He is yours.’’ 

Hayley was smiling from ear to ear when she heard that. She gave both her mother’s a tight hug. ‘’Thank you!’’ Her attention turned quickly to the dog again, she found a stick nearby on the ground. ‘’Let’s play,’’ she said to the dog before she ran away with the dog running after her and the stick. 

‘’Knew you would give in,’’ Sam said, smugly. 

‘’Oh shut it,’’ Lara rolled her eyes as she placed her arm around Sam’s shoulder. ‘’I hardly can say no to you two.’’ 

‘’I know,’’ Sam rested her head on her wife’s shoulder and smiled as she watched her kid play with the puppy. ‘’I love you.’’ 

‘’I love you too,’’ she replied as she too watched her child play with her new friend. She sighed, softly, with a smile resting on her lips. Life was good.

**Author's Note:**

> I know the Hayley-Hathor thing can be a bit of a reach, cause only the letters H and A of Hathor are in the name. But finding a girl's name that started with Hat wasn't easy. Hattie was option, but it didn't flow well enough with Amelia as a middle name. Also I just didn't really like the sound of the name. Anyways, let me know what you guys think of it.


End file.
